Our Gift of Tulips From Princess Juliana of the Netherlands

Every year Ottawa receives 20,000 tulip bulbs from the Netherlands Royal Family and the Dutch Bulb Growers, a thank you for sheltering the Royal Family and for Canada's help with liberation of the Netherlands during WWII.

In 1943 Princess Margriet Francisca, the younger sister of the current Queen of the Netherlands, was born at Ottawa Civic Hospital - the only royal ever to be born in North America. The Dutch Royal Family had fled to Canada in 1940 after the WWII invasion of their country. Among their problems - the expected royal child needed to be delivered on Dutch territory to be a Dutch citizen. So, Canada ceded this one hospital maternity room temporarily to the Netherlands. In appreciation, in the fall of 1945, Princess Juliana of the Netherlands presented Ottawa with 100,000 tulip bulbs.

Now you know how the world's largest tulip festival in Ottawa came to be.

Share this post

Comments (9)

My 100 year old Father is a WW2 vet. In 1995 he and my Mother went to Holland for the anniversary of the liberation. They were treated like royalty. Mom & Dad said the Dutch people were so warm, welcoming and THANKFUL. The Dutch people know more about our participation than a lot of Canadians do, which is sad. We should be proud of our history. :)

Well, I'm proud. Why not be proud. Sure would be nice to get rid of God keep our land from Oh Canada though. It wasn't there many years ago. Anyway, so Dutch food is horrible. I don't have plans to go there anyway.